12 Gifts We Can’t Afford To Lose:: What Noah Can Teach Us About Surviving the Storms of Life and Living Well

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Introduction

Are We Willing to Receive?

Jackie’s mother died just before his ninth birthday. After that he lived with his father on their farm.

With only one parent in the household, life can be difficult. That’s how it was for Jackie because he had to do most of the household chores and meal preparation while his father worked in the fields. On school days, their morning ritual was always the same. Jackie and his father got up before dawn to begin their chores. Jackie cooked breakfast. While he washed the dishes, his father went out to start the old pickup. The truck never started the first time, or even the third or fourth time. However, when it did finally start, his father backed up to the front door, and Jackie would run and jump into the truck.

This ritual happened every day, rain or shine. On one of those cold, wet days, instead of looking at the floorboard or out the window, Jackie looked at his father. He noticed the lines in his face that had been carved by the bitter wind. He saw his broad shoulders and his muscular arms. Jackie noticed his father’s hands. He could see calluses and bruises through the holes in his gloves. The moment he saw those hands, he instantly knew what he was going to buy his father for his birthday in six weeks.

After school that day, he talked to his teacher about helping at the school to make some money so he could buy his father a present. The teacher agreed to pay Jackie twenty-five cents a day ($1.25 each week), which meant it would take five weeks for him to save enough money to buy a new pair of gloves. Jackie was so excited.

Even though he had to stay up a little later at night to finish his chores at home, the five weeks went by quickly.

The day finally came when Jackie had enough money. His teacher went with him to buy the new gloves. His father’s birthday was a few days later, and Jackie was full of anticipation. Their morning ritual was just the same as always, but the moment Jackie jumped into the truck, he looked at his father and said, Dad, just a minute, I have a birthday present for you. He carefully unzipped his heavy coat and pulled out a brown paper bag that had been squeezed tightly at the top. His father opened the sack, took out the gloves, looked at them for a second and said, Oh, new gloves, and then threw the gloves behind the seat. Jackie could barely keep from crying. He had worked and sacrificed to give a gift from a heart of love, and all his father could do was toss the gift behind the seat.

I wonder how often we are just like Jackie’s father—recipients of beautiful gifts from a heart of love. Without realizing it, we have taken those gifts God gave us and tossed them behind the seat of our lives.

In this book, I focus upon twelve specific gifts that you and I have been offered from the heart of a faithful Heavenly Father. I believe all twelve gifts are described within the story of Noah and the ark. Each chapter of this book focuses upon a different part of this same story. We could get caught up in wondering whether the story of Noah and the ark really happened. We could ask, Is it historically correct? However, instead of focusing attention on historical questions, I want to focus attention upon religious questions such as: What does this story teach us about God’s faithfulness and His interaction with human life? As we look at this story, we see a loving God who is willing and able to give incredible gifts to humankind.

How can we gratefully receive the gifts God offers? How can we embrace and apply these gifts so that our lives will be better for it? What hinders us from doing so? If the story of Noah and the ark teaches us about our Heavenly Father’s faithfulness, how can we apply these lessons to our daily lives?

It is my belief that these twelve gifts are proof that we have been blessed by God’s faithfulness and are gifts we can’t afford to lose.

Questions

1

Gift One

The Word

So God said to Noah…

—Genesis 6:13

My wife, Diana, and I went on a trip to Europe. We had wanted to go on that trip for a long time, and we started planning for it a year before we left. After we decided when and where to go, I took responsibility to find hotels while Diana researched what we would do in each city. The first city we stopped in was Brussels, Belgium. Wow! What an amazing place. I wanted to find a hotel near the center of town because there were so many things to do there. I found a hotel and made a reservation, and then I discovered that, according to my best guess, there were eight chocolate stores within two blocks of the hotel. When we actually got to Brussels, I discovered that I was totally wrong. There were more than twenty chocolate shops within that distance, including the original Godiva chocolate store. Right across the street from our hotel was a place called The Chocolate Planet. It was wonderful! There were so many choices.

A few days later we were in the city of Delft, in the Netherlands. Every morning at breakfast we had the opportunity to make a choice. After you toasted your bread and spread Nutella on it, you could make another choice. You could then put dark or light chocolate on your Nutella: shaved or sprinkles. So many choices—so many good choices!

Life is full of choices, isn’t it? I believe the most important life choice is choosing to believe in Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. Jesus died on the cross so we could have forgiveness of our sins. He rose from the dead so we could have the gift of eternal life. When we accept Him as our Lord and Savior, He literally changes our life. There is no other choice that comes close to the importance of choosing Jesus as our Lord and Savior.

Some other important choices in life are:

Will we get married and to whom?

How do we find satisfaction and fulfillment in life?

What do we do about a career?

What do we believe about the Bible?

The first gift from God we can’t afford to lose is the gift of God’s Word. As we think about the Word of God, there are at least three reasons why His Word is a gift.

First, the Word of God is a gift because it is through the Word of God that we discover the heart of God.

I believe the Bible is the inspired, authentic, trustworthy, truthful, without error Word of God. It’s not just a book about God. It’s not just a book that contains the truth. No, it is the Word of God and is the Truth! The questions about the Bible and our lives are many. Some examples include the following:

Are we going to live life according to the truth of the Word of God?

Is the Bible going to be our final authority in life?

When life does not line up with the Word of God, do we change so that our character lines up with the Word of God?

Or do we live the way we want and then discount the Word of God, and say that part of the Word does not apply?

The one choice about the authority of the Word of God in life affects so many other life choices.

In Genesis 6, we read about an amazing man named Noah. The Bible says in Genesis 6:9, Noah was a righteous man…and he walked with God. Wow! What an amazing life he must have lived. Next, let’s read Genesis 6:11–12, Now the earth was corrupt…. [A]ll the people on earth had corrupted their ways. There was sinfulness, corruption, ungodliness, and unholiness. However, in the midst of all that, there was Noah—a righteous and godly man. I see a lot of similarities between the world in Noah’s time and today, but I am writing to encourage you to know that it is still possible to live a godly, holy, and righteous life before God and people. It depends upon how much authority we give the Word of God in our lives.

One of the main reasons Noah was righteous and godly was that he was willing to listen and be obedient to the Word of God. In Genesis 6:13, we read, So God said to Noah. The word said is the same word that is used in Genesis 1:3, when we read, And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light. When God speaks:

Universes form out of nothing

Chaos turns into order

Where once there was nothing—now there is something

Can you imagine what was happening in the heart of God at the time of Noah? His creativity and His created order were turned back into chaos. However, in the midst of all that, Noah was the one man who still chose to connect to and rely upon God. So God spoke once again. When He spoke to Noah, God shared His heart and His purpose. In the coming chapters, we look deep into this story of Noah and discover that when God spoke to Noah, it was not primarily about destruction. Rather, it was primarily about salvation. Let’s not miss that truth or reverse it. God had a plan. His plan was to bring salvation.

Today, God continues to speak to humankind through His Word. Today, He still speaks for salvation, not for destruction, as can be seen in the following Scriptures:

John 3:16: For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.

2 Peter 3:9: The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.

God’s heart desires that everyone know Jesus as their Lord and Savior. It is one of the main reasons God continues to speak through His Word. I truly believe that when we listen to and are obedient to the Word of God, as was Noah, then God can work in us and through us to bring the salvation of Jesus Christ into the chaos of a sinful and dying world.

Second, the Word of God is a gift because it is through the Word of God that we discover the desires of God.

Our salvation in Jesus Christ is not the end of God’s purposes for His Word in our lives. Rather it is just the beginning. After we choose to have faith in Christ, God’s desire is for us to grow in our faith. His desire is for us to grow in godliness, to grow in holiness, and to continue growing until we, like Noah, walk with God.

In 2 Timothy 3:16–17, we read, All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. What the apostle Paul was saying to Timothy, and to us, is that the Word of God—the God-breathed truth of God—can guide us, direct us, and teach us the ways of God.

We do not just believe in Jesus as our Lord and Savior, but we also choose to align our lives with the Word of God so that we grow in godliness, grow in righteousness, and grow in holiness.

The world today is in much the same chaos that the world was in during the time of Noah. I believe that God is speaking out to you and me—inviting us and also challenging us to be a people of His book. It is His desire for us to be a people who choose to live and grow according to His ways and His truth.

Third, the Word of God is a gift because it is through the Word of God that we discover the power of God.

Have you ever seen a set of architectural drawings for a building? Many decisions go into constructing a building of any size. What if you had plans and they looked good, but a decision was made to not follow them for the electrical system, the plumbing system, or the air-conditioning system? You would have a building, but the quality would be inferior. Problems would be massive and frustrations would be high.

The outcome is obvious when we ask those questions with architectural drawings that just involve a building. Now imagine what would happen if we did the same thing with our life and the Bible? God is the master architect of life. He is also the master architect of godliness and holiness. When we choose to align our life with His truth, it is amazing the joy and peace we experience in daily living. However, when our priorities, motives, or actions vary from the Truth of the Word of God, the result is sadness, emptiness, and chaos—as it was in the days of Noah.

Two purposes of the Word of God are:

To help us discover the heart of God which is to bring all people to faith in Jesus Christ

To help us discover the desire of God which is for us to grow in faith and godliness

Another purpose of the Word of God is to help us realize that we cannot live a holy and godly life by our own strength and power:

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities,